Putin's birthday blitz kills 28 in Ukraine as five children die in Pryluky apartment block collapse
From the Newshound archive · first published 6 October 2026 · last updated 9 October 2026.
A Russian drone targets a busy commercial bridge in central Kyiv, where ballistic missiles and drones killed at least two people overnight in what the Kremlin described as a 'massive' strike timed to Vladimir Putin's…
Russia's death toll from Wednesday's mass missile and drone barrage across Ukraine has risen to 28. Twenty of the dead — among them five children — perished when a single strike destroyed a five-storey residential building in Pryluky, Chernihiv. Zelensky described it as one of Russia's 'most vile' attacks, delivered as a 'birthday gift' to Putin on his 74th. More than 70 ballistic missiles and scores of drones hit Kyiv and 12 other regions, and Ukraine's air defences were powerless against the ballistic weapons owing to a shortage of Patriot interceptor ammunition.
Fourteen-year-old Daniel Umansky was killed at his Kyiv desk on September 25, his bloodied homework open to an essay on how a medieval ruler 'did not allow the powerful to oppress the poor and defenceless.'
Zelensky warned Russia will ESCALATE drone and missile strikes as winter approaches, with emergency power outages already ordered across Kyiv on top of regular rolling blackouts.
Ukraine struck back at Russian targets in the Perm, Samara and Astrakhan regions, and Zelensky said there was 'also a response in the Black Sea.'
